Only a few days ago I was listening to Morrissey. I was at work and used music to block out surrounding noise and concentrate. As I reflected on the use of music to ‘block’ noise, I suddenly captured Morrissey singing it back to me:

I’m doing very well
I can block out the present and the past now
I know by now you think I should have straightened myself out…

Talk about coincidence! But blocking was not the only thought that sprang to mind. It was also the fact that, if of sufficient quality, a song can inspire fiction writers the same as books do.

Take for instance some more of the same song’s lines:

Oh, something is squeezing my skull
Something I can barely describe
There is no love in modern life

What better way of describing a feeling of oppression, anxiety, unease than something squeezing your skull. I definitely was not going to pass the opportunity to adopt the expression in my book – still in the making…

Let’s hear some more fiction inspiring lyrics from the same man:

What really lies
Beyond the constraints of my mind?
Could it be the sea
With fate mooning back at me?
No, it’s just more lock-jawed pop-stars
Thicker than pig-s***
Nothing to convey
So scared to show intelligence
It might smear their lovely career